Method and circuit for operating a storage device

ABSTRACT

Memory systems like disk drives are usually sensitive to vibrations. In a consumer electronics environment, with reproduction of audio, this is a problem because audio reproduction means generating vibrations. To prevent performance degradation of the memory system, action is taken to reduce the influence of vibrations on the memory system. This is only done when the performance of the storage system drops below a pre-determined level when it causes such a degradation of performance that it is annoying for a user. Of course, the pre-determined level is—among others—influenced by the application that uses the memory system. Actions to be taken may be reducing the sound level, but also advising a user to reduce the sound level or cancel operations that use the storage system.

The invention relates to a method of operating a storage devicesensitive to vibrations in an environment with a source of vibrations.

The invention further relates to a circuit for operating a storagedevice in an environment with a source of vibrations, the circuitcomprising a processor.

The invention also relates to a consumer electronics apparatuscomprising means for receiving a stream of audio-visual data; a storagedevice arranged to store the stream of audio-visual data on a disk and asource of vibrations.

Such a method, circuit and apparatus are known from document U.S. Pat.No. 6,067,362. This document discloses an apparatus that reduces thegain of at least certain frequency components of sound produced by asound system when sound vibrations are expected to hamper theperformance parameters of the apparatus. When the level of the outputsound or at least of one frequency component of the output sound is toohigh, the gain of the sound or of that particular frequency component isreduced. The reduction of gain is aimed at preventing a negativeinfluence of vibrations caused by a high sound level on components ofthe apparatus like a CD-player or a hard disk.

The disclosed circuit always reduces the gain of the sound produced bythe apparatus when it exceeds a certain threshold, irrespective of theactivity of e.g. the CD-player or the hard disk.

It is an object of the invention to only have the vibrations reducedwhen these vibrations have a material effect on the performance of thestorage device.

This object is achieved by using the method according to the invention,which is characterized in that the method comprises the following steps:monitoring the performance of the storage device; and when theperformance of the storage device decreases below a pre-determinedlevel, taking action to reduce the influence of vibrations generated bythe source of vibrations.

The performance of the storage device—whether it is a hard disk drive,an optical disk drive or any other kind of storage device—may bemeasured as the maximum achievable data retrieval or storage rate or theaccess time. The pre-determined level may be determined by therequirements of the application retrieving data from or storing data inthe storage device.

The main advantage of using the method according to the invention isthat the influence of the vibrations is only reduced—by e.g. attenuationof sound produced by a sound source—when this is necessary to guaranteea required minimum performance of the storage device. When for exampleonly a bit-rate of 2 Mb per second is required, it is not necessary totake action when the maximum achievable bit-rate of the storage devicedrops from 35 Mb per second to 5 Mb per second due to vibrations.

In other words: using the method according to the invention ensures thatthe apparatus applying the method functions according to userpreferences as long as possible, i.e. until performance of the apparatusis hampered in a way that a user notices it.

In an embodiment of the method according to the invention, the actioncomprises the step of providing a message to a user to reduce thevibrations.

Automatic setting of an apparatus, said setting having been set by auser, may be annoying for said user. To prevent annoyance, the user maybe provided with a message telling him that he should reduce vibrations,for example reduce the sound level, to ensure proper functioning of thestorage device.

In an embodiment of the invention, when the performance decreases belowthe pre-determined level and the environmental temperature of thestorage device is above a further pre-determined level, no action istaken.

The performance of a storage device and especially the performance of ahard disk drive is influenced by the temperature of the storage device.A hot environment may also cause performance degradation of the storagedevice, below the predetermined level at which the method according tothe invention takes action. However, reducing vibrations would havelittle or no effect on the performance of the hard disk drive.Therefore, no action is taken when the performance of the storage deviceis reduced to below a pre-determined level and the temperature of thestorage device is above a further predetermined level.

In a further embodiment of the invention, the source of vibrations is aloudspeaker, and the loudspeaker and the storage device are comprised inthe same housing and the housing is a consumer electronics apparatus;the storage device is arranged to record an incoming stream ofaudio-visual data; the consumer electronics apparatus is arranged toreproduce the incoming stream of audio-visual data by means of a screenand the loudspeaker; and wherein the method comprises the steps of:storing the incoming stream of audio-visual data on a disk by thestorage device, and reproducing the stored stream of audio-visual datastored on the disk by means of a screen and the loudspeaker, and theaction to reduce the influence of vibrations generated by the source ofvibrations comprises the step of advising a user to display the incomingstream of audio-visual data instead of the stored stream of audio-visualdata.

Timeshifting of video data with a time period of for example 5 minutesor even a couple of hours is known. Most implementations use a harddisk, to which data is written simultaneously with the reading of datathat has been stored for the time period mentioned, say 5 minutes. Suchan implementation may be built in a stand-alone video recorder, but alsoin a TV-set. Most known TV-sets also have built-in speakers. When thesound volume is so high that sound vibrations interfere with theoperation of the hard disk, this may affect the time shiftoperation—reading and writing of data—in such a way that the quality ofthe reading and writing process is affected, which is disadvantageous toa user.

One solution could be the reduction of gain, but when a user does notaccept this option, it might be an option to switch from time-shiftedviewing to live viewing. When the time-shift delay is only small, thiswill not be a big problem for a user and he can fast forward to livereproduction of the TV-program. In the case of live viewing, the harddisk does not have to be used and when the hard disk is not inoperation, operation cannot be hampered by vibrations, which is a clearadvantage.

In yet a further embodiment of the invention, the housing is a consumerelectronics apparatus arranged to reproduce of audio-visual data; atleast one further loudspeaker, not comprised by the consumer electronicsapparatus, is connected to the consumer electronics apparatus; and theaction comprises the steps of: halting reproduction of the audio-visualdata through the loudspeaker comprised by the consumer electronicsapparatus; and starting reproduction of the audio-visual data throughthe further loudspeaker.

Most TV-sets—and other consumer electronics devices—are equipped withconnections to connect the TV-set to further speakers or homeentertainment systems. This enables a user to connect his TV-set tofurther and—most often—also better speakers. Usually, such speakers arelocated away from the TV-set, so vibrations of such speakers areunlikely to influence the performance of the storage device in theTV-set.

Therefore, in the case of vibrations hampering performance of thestorage device, vibrations due to sound reproduction by speakerscomprised by the TV-set, user inconvenience is reduced to a minimum whenswitching sound reproduction to remote speakers. This minimized userinconvenience is of course a great advantage of this embodiment.

In again a further embodiment of the invention, the source of vibrationsis comprised by a first apparatus and the storage device is comprised bya second apparatus; the first and the second apparatus are connectedthrough a network link; the action is controlling the second apparatusby reducing the power of the vibrations caused by the source ofvibrations.

Home networks enable communication between all sorts of electronicsdevices; for example between a home storage server and a large speaker.When these two devices are located not very far away, about a meter, thevibrations of the large speaker while reproducing audio data, may hamperproper operation of the server. To reduce the influence of thevibrations produced by the speaker on the server, the server can controlthe gain of the speaker and reduce it.

In another embodiment of the invention, the pre-determined level isreplaced by a further lower pre-determined level when the performance ofthe storage device is below the predetermined level during apre-determined period.

The performance of the storage device may well be below the threshold atwhich, according to the invention, action is taken for a longer periodof time. In some cases, this might be the case when a user prefers ahigh sound level, especially of lower frequency components, and takesthe performance degradation of the storage device and all itsconsequences for granted. In that case, action is taken continuously,which may be quite annoying to a user of the consumer electronicsapparatus according to the invention.

To prevent this, this embodiment replaces the pre-determined level belowwhich action is taken to reduce the influence of the vibrations by afurther lower pre-determined level when the performance of the storagedevice is below the pre-determined level during a longer period of time.

The circuit according to the invention is characterized in that theprocessor is conceived to: monitor the performance of the storagedevice; and when the performance of the storage device decreases below apre-determined level, take action to reduce the influence of vibrationsgenerated by the source of vibrations.

The consumer electronics apparatus according to the invention comprisesthe circuit defined in claim 16 for controlling the storage device.

Embodiments of the invention will now be presented by means of Figures,in which:

FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of the consumer electronics apparatuscomprising an embodiment of the circuit according to the invention;

FIG. 2 shows a TV-set as a further embodiment of the invention;

FIG. 3 shows a TV-set connected to satellite speakers as a furtherembodiment of the invention;

FIG. 4 shows a network environment as an embodiment of the invention;and

FIG. 5 shows a TV-set connected to a subwoofer unit as anotherembodiment of the invention.

FIG. 1 shows an apparatus 100 as an embodiment of the consumerelectronics device according to the invention. The apparatus 100comprises a receiver 102 for receiving a signal 180 from a data sourcelike cable, satellite, roof antenna and the like, an analogue to digitalconverter (A/D converter) 104, a compression unit 106, a storage device108, a decompression unit 110, a video processor 112, an audio processor114, a left speaker 116, a right speaker 118, a display unit 120 and acontrol unit 150.

The receiver 102 is arranged to select and derive a baseband signal fromthe incoming signal 180. The baseband signal is sent to the A/Dconverter 104 to convert the baseband signal to a digital stream ofaudio-visual data. The stream of audio-visual data is transferred to thecompression unit 106, which compresses the stream. When the basebandsignal is already digital, as in Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB), theA/D converter 104 is obsolete and in some cases, even the compressionunit 106 is obsolete, because the incoming signal is already a digitalcompressed stream of audio-visual data.

The compressed stream of audio-visual data is stored in the storagedevice 108, which in this embodiment is a hard disk drive. The storedstream can be reproduced by the left speaker 116, the right speaker 118and the display unit 120. The stream can be reproduced directly uponstorage, but also a few minutes later or even hours or days later. Inthis way, the storage device 108 can be used for a time-shift operation,in which a user is enabled to pause the reproduction of a livetelevision program and continue the reproduction with a delay, byviewing data stored in the storage device 108. During the reproduction,data received is still stored in the storage device 108.

For presentation of the stored stream of audio-visual data, the streamis decompressed by the decompression unit 110. The decompression unit110 also splits the stream of audio-visual data into an audio part and avideo part.

The video part is further processed by the video processor 112 and theaudio part is further processed by the audio processor 114. The videoprocessor 112 converts the digital video part to an analogue video partand processes the analogue video signal in such a way that it can bepresented by the display unit 120. The display unit 120 may be embodiedby a cathode ray tube, a liquid crystal display, a plasma display or anyother video display means.

The audio processor 14 converts the digital audio part to an analogueaudio part and process the analogue audio signal in such a way that itcan be reproduced by the left speaker 116 and the right speaker 118.Although in this embodiment a stereo audio set-up is presented, it willbe apparent to a person skilled in the art that any kind of audio set-upis possible, from mono to any imaginable multi-channel sound set-up.

In this embodiment, the speakers are comprised by the apparatus 100.This may be a problem for the storage device, as has been acknowledgedby the prior art. Vibrations generated by the speakers disturb thefunctionality of the storage device 108. Examples of this are numerous,especially in the case of a disk-based memory like a Digital VersatileDisc or a hard disk drive. Vibrations propagating into the actuator ordisk assembly are viewed as external disturbances, which makes it moredifficult for the pick-up unit to follow a track on the disk

Besides, the vibrations affect the pick up unit itself Vibration causebad reading of data leading to degradation of the performance of thememory and in the worst case, even crash of the pick-up unit in thedisk, which is disastrous for the lifetime and performance aspects ofthe storage device. Such effects are often obscured for a while to theintegral apparatus 100 by error handling procedures in the apparatus100. Only a performance monitoring tool may detect the onset of thesechanges.

Prior-art systems try to kill the vibrations but do it in a rigid way,even when this is not necessary. For example, when the storage device isnot in use and the pick-up unit is in a safe position, vibrations cannotdegrade the performance of the storage device. Therefore, the vibrationsdo not have to be killed. Furthermore, when only little performance isneeded, say 20% of the nominal performance, and vibrations bring downperformance to a level of 50% of the nominal performance, the vibrationsdo not have to be killed either.

This is an important basic principle. Especially when the vibrations arecaused by a sound source, it is not desirable to unnecessarily modifythe sound volume because this is annoying for a user. Using the methodaccording to the invention, action is only taken to reduce thevibrations when the vibrations cause unacceptable degradation of theperformance of the storage device; when the performance drops below apre-determined level. Of course, the setting of the pre-determined levelmay depend on the application that uses the storage device.

The performance may be measured in various ways. In the embodiment ofthe invention described by means of FIG. 1, the control unit 150 keepsstatistics on the access time of the storage device 108. When theaverage access time is too long for a certain amount of time, say over500 milliseconds for a period of 10 seconds, action is taken. Of course,various related embodiments are obvious to those skilled in the art,such as taking action when the median access time is too high, themaximum access time is too high or the standard deviation of the accesstime is too high.

In a further embodiment of the invention, action is taken when theaverage bit-rate of data flowing from the storage device 108 to thedecompression unit 110 drops below a predetermined level. Again, variousvariations are obvious to a person skilled in the art.

As mentioned in a previous paragraph, the pre-determined level maydepend on the application that uses the storage device. When theapplication is the reproduction of a stream of audio-visual data that isstored on the storage device, this application may require a certainbit-rate for proper operation, say 4 Megabits per second. When thestorage device is used by this application only, the performance of thestorage device may be determined by the bit-rate and the pre-determinedlimit is 4 Megabits per second, preferably with a safety margin of 10%.

Actions that can be taken to reduce the level of the vibrations arenumerous and depend on the set-up of an apparatus using the methodaccording to the invention or an embodiment thereof. Embodimentsdescribed here are mainly related to audio vibrations. However, theinvention may be used as well to reduce the influence of othervibrations on a storage system.

First, the apparatus can take action itself to kill the vibrations.Various embodiments of the method according the invention doing thiswill be discussed hereinafter. In another embodiment of the methodaccording to the invention, the apparatus takes action to reduce theinfluence of the vibrations by providing a message to a user of theapparatus. The message advises a user to reduce vibrations. When thisembodiment of the method according to the invention is used for examplein a digital television set where the vibrations are most likely to becaused by sound produced by built-in speakers, a user may be suppliedwith an on-screen message to turn down the volume produced by thetelevision set.

In a further embodiment, when a television set equipped with a recordingdevice records a television program for time shift purposes, a user isadvised to watch the recorded program in a live mode, rather than with adelay. In this way, the program does not have to be recorded and therecording process is not influenced by any vibrations, because there isno recording process.

In yet a further embodiment of the invention, general ‘household’activities of the hard disk, like background defragmentation, are haltedwhen the performance of the hard disk drive degrades because of e.g.vibrations. In this way, the normal recording and/or playback processcan be continued without problems. The ‘household’ activities arecontinued when the performance of the hard disk drive is up again.

As mentioned previously, the apparatus can take also action itself toreduce the influence of vibrations. In one embodiment according to theinvention, the amount of vibrations is reduced. When this embodiment ofthe method according to the invention is used in a TV-set 200 (FIG. 2)comprising speakers 210 (FIG. 2) which produce vibrations (sound)disturbing the performance of a storage device built in the TV-set, thevolume of the sound produced by the speakers is reduced. In yet anotherembodiment, only the levels of certain parts of the frequency spectrumcausing vibrations are killed. Examples may be found in U.S. Pat. No.6,067,362.

However, it might be possible that a user prefers a loud sound to gowith a program presented by a TV-set and still wants to record aprogram. In this case, the problem may be solved by shutting downspeakers comprised by the TV-set and provide sound via other speakers.This is depicted in FIG. 3, which shows a TV-set 300 with a built-inleft speaker 310, a built-in right speaker 320 and connected to a leftsatellite speaker 330, a right satellite speaker 340 and a backsatellite speaker 350. The TV-set 300 comprises a storage device (notshown).

When the performance of the storage device drops below a level which isnot acceptable for the task it is performing at that time, the sound ofthe built-in left speaker 310 and the built-in right speaker 320 is cutoff and re-directed to the left satellite speaker 330, the rightsatellite speaker 340, respectively, and—optionally—the back satellitespeaker 350.

The remote speakers may already have been switched on when sound to thebuilt-in speakers is switched off. In one embodiment of the methodaccording to the invention, no sound is redirected from the built-inspeakers to the remote speakers. In a further embodiment, the sound ofthe built-in speakers is re-directed and added to the sound alreadyproduced by the remote speakers.

When the satellite speakers are located far away enough, the soundvibrations they produce will no longer influence the storage devicebuilt in the TV-set 300. When the sound level produced by the TV-set isreduced to a level at which no degradation of the performance of thestorage device was detected, the built-in left speaker 310 and thebuilt-in right speaker 320 may be switched on again.

Alternatively, this is done when the performance of the storage deviceincreases to a level above a further pre-determined limit that may beequal to the pre-determined level at which the sound of the built-inleft speaker 310 and the built-in right speaker 320 is cut off.

Another embodiment of the method according to the invention will bedescribed with reference to FIG. 4, which shows a network environment400, comprising a server 410, a TV-set 420, a first speaker 430 locatedclose to the TV-set 420 comprising a storage device (not shown), asecond speaker 440 located away from the TV-set 420 and a wired orwireless network 450 connecting all devices. The devices may communicateover the network directly to each other or via the server 410, using anykind of protocol from Aloha to USB and TCP/IP and many more withoutdeparting from the scope of the invention.

In normal operation of the TV-set 420 when reproducing audio-visual datastored on the storage device, audio data is reproduced by the firstspeaker 430. When the performance of the storage device drops below apre-determined level, this is signaled to the server 410, which willlower the sound produced by the first speaker 430.

The reduction of the sound volume may be compensated by reproducing theaudio-data by the second speaker 440 as well. Since the second speaker440 is located away from the TV-set, influence of the sound vibrationsproduced by the second speaker 440 on the performance of the storagedevice will be much less. In a further embodiment of the invention, thestorage device is located in the server 410, which may be located in thevicinity of a speaker or other source of vibrations as well.

Vibrations may be airborne like sound waves traveling through the air,but also traveling in structures and traveling from one structure to anadjacent structure. FIG. 5 shows a TV-set 500 comprising a storagedevice (not shown), with a sub-woofer unit 520 connected thereto. Thesub-woofer unit 520 is a speaker designed to augment low frequencycomponents of an audio signal, preferably generated by the TV-set 500.

While producing low-frequency audio signals, not only the speakermembrane (not shown) of the sub-woofer unit 520 will vibrate, but alsothe full outer structure of the sub-woofer unit 520. These vibrationswill be transferred to the TV-set 500, influencing the performance ofthe storage device. According to a preferred embodiment, when the levelof vibrations is too high so that normal operation of the storage deviceis not possible, the sub-woofer is turned off by a controller (notshown) in the TV-set 500. In a further embodiment of the invention, thesound produced by the subwoofer is attenuated when vibrations hamperproper performance of the storage device.

Airborne or structure-borne vibrations may also be amplified by theenvironment in which the TV-set 500 is placed. In that case, the methodaccording to the invention will take action at a lower sound volume.

FIG. 6 shows a consumer electronics recording device 600 for recordingaudio-visual data. The recording device 600 comprises an optical diskdrive 610 for reading data from and writing audio-visual data to anoptical disk 620 and further comprises a hard disk drive 630 for storageand retrieval of audio-visual data.

When reading or writing data at high speeds—higher than real-time—, theoptical disk 620 is rotated at high speeds, generating aerodynamicnoise. This is a very wide spectrum noise having a significant energylevel, causing the structure of the recording device 600 to vibrate.Since the hard disk drive 630 is built in the structure of the recordingdevice 600, vibration will be transferred to the hard disk drive 630,hampering the performance of the hard disk drive 630.

The influence of the vibration in the structure on the hard disk drive630 may be reduced by various means of suspension, but since consumerelectronics devices should not be too large and not too heavy, this isnot always a proper solution. Furthermore, suspension does not solve theproblem of airborne vibrations caused by the optical disk drive 610 andisolation to solve this problem consumes valuable space and createscooling problems.

According to an embodiment of the method according to the invention, therecording device takes action to reduce the influence of the vibrationscaused by the optical disk drive 610 on the performance of the hard diskdrive 630. In one embodiment, the rotation speed of the optical disk 630is reduced. In a further embodiment, a user is warned that the highrotation speed of the optical disk is hampering the performance of thehard disk drive 630 and the user is either advised to reduce therotational speed of the optical disk or cancel activities that involveaction of the hard disk drive 630.

The performance of the storage device may well be below the threshold atwhich, according to the invention, action is taken for a longer periodof time. For certain embodiments, this might be the case when a userprefers a high sound level, especially of lower frequency components,and takes the performance degradation of the storage device and all itsconsequences for granted. In that case, action is taken continuously,which may be quite annoying to a user of the consumer electronicsapparatus according to the invention.

To prevent this, an embodiment of the method according to the inventionreplaces the pre-determined level below which action is taken to reducethe influence of the vibrations by a further lower pre-determined levelwhen the performance of the storage device is below the pre-determinedlevel during a longer period of time.

Also, the performance of a storage device and especially the performanceof a hard disk drive is influenced by the temperature of the storagedevice. A hot environment may also cause performance degradation belowthe pre-determined level at which the method according to the inventiontakes action. However, reducing vibrations would have little or noeffect on the performance of the hard disk drive. Therefore, accordingto an embodiment of the invention, no action is taken when theperformance of the storage device reduces below a pre-determined leveland the temperature of the storage device is above a flierpre-determined level.

To this end, the storage device may be equipped with a temperaturesensor. Some hard disk drives are already equipped with a temperaturesensor; this sensor may be used when employing this embodiment of themethod according to the invention.

It will be apparent to any person skilled in the art from thedescription of the preferred embodiment that the source of vibrations isnot limited to sound sources or spinning disks, but extends beyond that.The invention may also be employed in cars, which are known to be anenvironment with lots of vibrations.

It will also be apparent that the storage device is not limited to ahard disk drive or an optical disk drive, but may be used in anyenvironment using a storage device susceptible to vibrations.

Furthermore, it will be understood as well that the action taken by themethod according to the invention when the performance of the storagedevice drops below a pre-determined level may be embodied in numerousways; direct as well as via a user of a device employing the methodaccording to the invention.

The invention may be summarized as follows:

Memory systems like disk drives are usually sensitive to vibrations. Ina consumer electronics environment, with reproduction of audio, this isa problem because audio reproduction means generating vibrations. Toprevent performance degradation of the memory system, action is taken toreduce the influence of vibrations on the memory system. This is onlydone when the performance of the storage system drops below apre-determined level when it causes such a degradation of performancethat it is annoying for a user. Of course, the pre-determined levelis—among others—influenced by the application that uses the memorysystem. Actions to be taken may be reducing the sound level, but alsoadvising a user to reduce the sound level or cancel operations that usethe storage system.

1. A method of operating a storage device sensitive to vibrations in anenvironment with a source of vibrations, characterized in that themethod comprises the following steps: (a) monitoring the performance ofthe storage device, and (b) when the performance of the storage devicedecreases below a pre-determined level, taking action to reduce theinfluence of vibrations generated by the source of vibrations.
 2. Amethod as claimed in claim 1, wherein the performance of the storagedevice is indicated by service time statistics of the storage device. 3.A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the performance of the storagedevice is indicated by the average bit-rate of the storage device.
 4. Amethod as claimed in claim 1, wherein the action comprises the step ofproviding a message to a user to reduce the vibrations.
 5. A method asclaimed in claim 1, wherein the source of vibrations is at least oneloudspeaker, and the loudspeaker and the storage device comprised in thesame housing.
 6. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the source ofvibrations is a loudspeaker and the action is reduction of the volume ofthe sound produced by the loudspeaker.
 7. A method as claimed in claim1, wherein when the performance decreases below the pre-determined leveland the environmental temperature of the storage device is above afurther pre-determined level, no action is taken.
 8. A method as claimedin claim 5, wherein (a) the housing is a consumer electronics apparatus;(b) the storage device is arranged to record an incoming stream ofaudio-visual data; (c) the consumer electronics apparatus is arranged toreproduce the incoming stream of audio-visual data by means of a screenand the loudspeaker; and wherein the method comprises the steps of: (d)storing the incoming stream of audio-visual data on a disk by thestorage device; and (e) reproducing the stored stream of audio-visualdata stored on the disk by means of a screen and the loudspeaker.
 9. Amethod as claimed in claim 8, wherein the action to reduce the influenceof vibrations generated by the source of vibrations comprises the stepof advising a user to display the incoming stream of audio-visual datainstead of the stored stream of audio-visual data.
 10. A method asclaimed in claim 5, wherein (a) the housing is a consumer electronicsapparatus arranged to reproduce audio-visual data; (b) at least onefurther loudspeaker, not comprised by the consumer electronicsapparatus, is connected to the consumer electronics apparatus; and (c)the action comprises the steps of: i.) halting reproduction of theaudio-visual data through the loudspeaker comprised by the consumerelectronics apparatus; and ii.) starting reproduction of theaudio-visual data through the further loudspeaker.
 11. A method asclaimed in claim 1, wherein the source of vibrations is comprised by afirst apparatus and the storage device is comprised by a secondapparatus; the first and the second apparatus are connected through anetwork link; and the action is controlling the second apparatus byreducing the power of the vibrations caused by the source of vibrations.12. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the pre-determined level isreplaced by a further lower pre-determined level when the performance ofthe storage device is below the predetermined level during apre-determined period.
 13. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein thevibrations are vibrations in a structure comprising the storage device.14. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the vibrations are airbornevibrations.
 15. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the storagedevice is a disk drive.
 16. A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein theaction is halting activities related to the storage device other thanstorage and retrieval of audio-visual data.
 17. Circuit for operating astorage device in an environment with a source of vibrations, thecircuit comprising a processor, characterized in that the processor isconceived to: (a) monitor the performance of the storage device; and (b)when the performance of the storage device decreases below apredetermined level, take action to reduce the influence of vibrationsgenerated by the source of vibrations.
 18. Consumer electronicsapparatus comprising: (a) means for receiving a stream of audio-visualdata; (b) a storage device arranged to store the stream of audio-visualdata on a disk; (c) a source of vibrations; (d) the circuit according toclaim 17 for controlling the storage device.
 19. Consumer electronicsapparatus as claimed in claim 18, wherein the source of vibrations is adisk drive arranged to spin a disk in operation.
 20. Consumerelectronics apparatus as claimed in claim 17, wherein the source ofvibrations is a loudspeaker.